Week 8-lesson plan

Candidate’s Name: Aviva Zussman              

Grade Level: 1^st grade           

Title of the lesson: Silly Sounds

Length of the lesson: One 45 minute class period plus homework

 

Central focus:   Improving student fluency skills

Knowledge of students Print Awareness, Phonemic Awareness, ABC, letter identification, first grade reading level

Common Core State Standards (   CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.1.2-Retell stories, including key details, and demonstrate understanding of their central message or lesson. CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.1.6-Identify who is telling the story at various points in a text

Support literacy development through language   Retell story in different ways to increase reading fluency

Learning objectives Students will retell stories repeatedly to improve their reading fluency and their comprehension of the story.

Formal and informal assessment (including type[s] of assessment and what is being assessed)   Informal assessments will be done while the students practice and record their stories the teacher will listen in to ensure that it is being done correctly.

Instructional strategies and learning tasks (including what you and the students will be doing) that support diverse student needs. Your design should be based on the following:   Students will choose a book to read out loud. Students will be told that they will record themselves reading these books into a voice recorder several times using different voices. The students will need to choose the different voices that they will use to record that represent the different characters in the story. After rehearsing the story several times students will begin recording. After the recordings are completed students will be asked to take their recordings home to show their families and vote on which voice sounded the best. Struggling students will choose an easier story that is on their level to read. They also may need extra practice with a teacher before recording.

Instructional resources and materials used to engage students in learning. Voice recorder

Reflection Did your instruction support learning for the whole class and the students who need great support or challenge?] My lesson is designed to be stimulating for all students regardless of their ability since each child can accomplish the task on their own learning level. What changes would you make to support better student learning of the central focus? Perhaps for the stronger students I would have them write their own stories to read and record to not only improve their reading fluency but their writing skills as well. Why do you think these changes would improve student learning? Support your explanation from evidence of research and/or theory. I think that these changes would improve student learning since it is well known that the more students write, the better writers they will be.

 

Dr. Hui-Yin Hsu Spring 2014

Week 7-Assignment 5

Reading Assessment on Tamar Z-first grade student

I conducted my reading assessment on my six year old niece over skype. She is in first grade and is considered to be an average reader. The book that she chose was “Teaching My Dog 100 Words”. The following are the results in the four different areas being discussed:

Print Awareness:

When Tamar took the book to read I asked her to show me the title of the book, where the author’s name is and the first page of the book. I also asked her to show me the page number on each page and the difference between the pictures and the text. She was able to answer me with total ease.

Speech Sounds:

For this assessment I had Tamar read me the first page of the book-“I can teach my dog 100 words”. I then took the word “dog” and asked her to say it over very slowly and tell me how many sounds (phonemes) were in the word. She answered correctly-3. I then asked her if she were to replace the d with an h what the word would say. She answered hog. Then I asked if she were to replace the g with a k what the word would say. She again answered correctly-dok.

Phonemic Awareness:

For this test I wished Tamar a “Happy Purim” in a very slow way making sure to enunciate each sound of the word. I then asked her if she was able to understand what I said and she said “yes”. I then asked her to tell me her name in a way that pronounces each sound and she was able to do so with ease. I then asked her to tell me different words that begin with the letter d and she told me dog, dig, daddy.

Phonics:

For this test I took the word dog and wrote it in the following ways for Tamar to read: dag, deg, dig, dog, dug. The purpose of this was for her to blend similar letters with different combinations. She was able to do so with ease.

Over all, Tamar proved to be a much stronger reader than I expected. I would have expected some difficulty in being able to read similar letter combinations with different vowels since my students in Israel struggle with that. To help students who this is an issue for I would suggest would to look at the website Pinterest. They have an array of adorable videos and resources teaching the vowel sounds that could help children remember and identify these sounds. Another website with helpful resources that I found was ReadWriteThink. This website had lesson plans using Dr. Seuss stories to teach phonemic sounds that I think students would really enjoy. Another helpful website that I found was the brainpop website. They have educational videos and interactive games for students to learn the vowel sounds. Students can identify phonemic sounds in the barn yard and can use a cute animated character named MOBY to spell out different words.

 

Assignment 4-Phoncs

Phonics:

For the phonics prestest I scored da 9/10. The question I answered incorrectly was the appropriate age to begin phonics instruction. Interestingly enough on the post test I scored 7/10. Over all it seems that phonics is an integral part of a reading program. Research shows that phonics is only effective when taught in a systematic way. As we know all literacy instruction should be based on research and phonics should definitely be included in our instruction. My question about phonics is if it is detrimental to introduce phonics in a nonsystematic way. Meaning to say if teachers would point out phonetic rules outside of the systematic instruction, would that hinder the student’s reading progress?  

Assignment 3-Phonemic Awareness

Phonemic Awareness:

My confidence continued to dwindle after taking the phonemic awareness test. Having only answered six of the questions correctly, I realize that I need to learn a lot in this area. The first question answered incorrectly was: “The ability to hear, identify, and manipulate the onsets and rimes in words is called______: phonological awareness”. I answered phonemic awareness. The second question answered incorrectly was: “The ability to hear, identify, and manipulate discrete, individual sounds in words is called: phonemic awareness”. I answered phonological awareness. The third question answered incorrectly was: “Phonemic awareness differs from phonics in that phonemic awareness is: understanding that spoken words are made up of sounds”. I chose all of the above. The fourth question answered incorrectly was: “To teach phonemic awareness, teachers should focus on developing their students’ ___________ skills: oral”. I answered all of the above. Thankfully on the post exam I scored 10/10.

What I learned from this assessment that it is important to differentiate between phonological and phonemic awareness. In order to provide students with the optimum instruction, teachers need to pinpoint to the most specific level where the student is struggling. I wonder if there are students who struggle only in small areas or if there are students who either thrive or struggle in all areas of reading. What I enjoyed about this section are all of the fun ideas that teachers can use to teach phonemic awareness.

Assignment 2-Speech Sounds

Speech Sounds:

Although I was somewhat confident after taking the print awareness test, when I saw the questions about speech sounds, I got a little nervous. Surprisingly enough however, I scored a 7/10 correctly on the pretest and luckily scored perfectly on the post test. I answered the following questions incorrectly: “Speech sounds are also called: phonemes”. I answered “graphemes”. I realized only after seeing the results that this was not the most logical option to choose since the remainder of the test focused on phonemes. Additionally, looking at the word graphemes indicates that this word would have something to do with the way it appears. The second question that I answered incorrectly was: “The word ran has how many phonemes: 3”. I answered 1 since I thought that phonemes and syllables were synonymous. The third question answered incorrectly was: “How many phonemes do you hear in the word nope?: 3”. I answered one for the same reason listed above having to do with the syllables.

What I learned from this assessment is that there are many different aspects involved in speech sounds. As teachers it is important to be aware of the terms and how they play out in literacy.  I am eager to learn the technicalities of speech sounds and how to implement them when teaching my students. I am curious to know how to teach students who cannot hear how to read. I am sure this is a fascinating topic and am looking forward to learning more.  The games and activities that were listed in the literature seemed like very practical ways to teach children how to identify the sounds in words.

Assignment 1-pre test print awareness

Print Awareness

The print awareness pretest module had basic questions describing print awareness and how it effects learning. I got 9/10 of the questions correct. The question that I got wrong was the first question that was “Print awareness is: recognizing written language and understanding how it’s used”. I chose the option “none of the above”. Looking back I am not sure why I selected that option. To develop some sort of reasoning behind my answer I would say that I thought that print awareness was limited to the technicalities of reading such as the mechanics of books, different types of reading etc. I guess that this definition is included in the answer “recognizing written language and understanding how it’s used”. On the post test I scored a 9/10. The question answered incorrectly was "An example of print awareness can be seen in which of the following? a child points to a McDonald billboard and yells "Mommy, I want a happy meal!". I answered "a child lies in her father's arms listening to a bedtime story.

Things that I would still need to know are how to compensate for students who were not taught about print awareness before they reached my classroom. I am aware of the importance of print awareness but I would like to know the specific linkage when it comes to developing reading skills. I also wonder if a child can still be successful even if he was never explicitly taught the mechanics of the way books work. All in all I feel that I know the significance of print awareness on a surface level but am eager to understanding it on a deeper level.

week 6

Assignment (due March 4, by noon, on blog)

Assuming Mary is in your class, what kind of in-class instructional intervention you will design to focus on the Mary’s strengths while addressing possible areas of need. Describe in details on the following:

• Instructional focus based on the assessment results
   
  Based on the assessment results it seems that one of the main focuses should be on building Mary’s comprehension skills. I think that an effective way that this could be done is to develop a set of focus questions for Mary to keep in mind while she is reading the text. Meaning to say when the passage is being introduced and her prior knowledge is coming out, the teacher should pin point a select amount of important facts that Mary can be mindful of while reading. It should be clear that these focus questions are not to distract her from her ability to read the text normally. Rather these questions are meant to guide her to understanding the main idea of the passage. Furthermore, I think that the look back method would also be helpful for Mary. Often times students get caught up in the technical aspect of reading and forget to look for the content. Therefore, it is an important skill for students to develop to be able to identify the main messages of the text and be able to locate them when answering a question.
   
• Length of Intervention (How many weeks? Daily lessons? How long is the lesson while maintaining the rest of your class?)
   
  The intervention that I mentioned is not necessarily a formal lesson that will take a certain amount of time. Rather what I suggested is a change in the style of the introduction of every lesson. Whenever Mary (and other students as well) read a passage apart of the introduction should be these focus questions. In reference to the look back method, I think that two lessons of teaching Mary how to identify and highlight the main points would be sufficient. This can be done through Mary reading a regular passage that she would be reading anyways in class. Instead of reading the passage in one large chunk, it would be broken up into paragraphs. After each paragraph Mary would be asked what the paragraph was meant to tell her. After Mary identifies these important points she would be asked to highlight the words that convey these points in different colors. This way when Mary is asked questions at the end of the passage she would be able to look back at her highlighted points quickly and answer the questions correctly.
   
• Intervention structure (intervention components, such as repeated reading, decoding, encoding, expository structure and details, writing…)
  The intervention structure would be to reread the text in smaller chunks then to identify what the smaller chunks are saying. I would have Mary read the whole passage then ask her comprehension questions. I would write down her answers so that we can compare her answers after reading the text just once to her answers after rereading the passage. Next we would read the passage one paragraph at a time. After each paragraph I would ask Mary to tell me the main idea of the paragraph and I would write it down. Next I would ask Mary to highlight the words in the paragraph that says the main idea. After this is done with each paragraph, I would reask her the comprehension questions from before. I would rewrite Mary’s answers and show her at the end how much more complete her answers were after rereading the text. If during the time that Mary is reanswering the questions she needs to look back, she could easily find the answers since she highlighted all of the main points.
   
• Create one sample mini-lesson that addresses Mary’s areas of need. ]
   
  Expository Text-“Where Do People Live?” (pg 237 in Qualitative Reading Inventory-5 textbook)
   
  People live in different places. Some people live in a city. Others live in the country. Still other people live in between the city and the country. They live in suburbs. Why do people live in these different places>
  People live in the city to be near their jobs. Cities have lots of factories, schools and offices. People work in these buildings. If people don’t want to drive a long way to their jobs, they live in the city. There are many other things to do in the city. Cities have museums and zoos. They also have many movie theaters.
  People live in the country to be close to their jobs, too. Many people who live in the country are farmers. They plant crops on their land. They may sell their crops or may use them to feed the animals they live on the farm. Farmers raise cows, pigs, and chickens. The main food that these animals eat is grain. There are other things to do in the country. You can find a river t fish in or take walks in the woods. The life in the country is quiet. People live in between the country and the city. They live in suburbs. Some people think that people who live in the suburbs have the best of both worlds. They live close to their jobs in the city. The suburbs are quieter than the city. They often have man movie theaters, too. It doesn’t take as long to go to either the city or the country. The suburbs are more crowded than the country but less crowded than the city. Where people live depends upon what they like most.
   To introduce the above expository text I would start off by asking where my student lived and the reasons she lives there. I would then ask her where she thinks a farmer lived and why. The focus questions for this passage would be: 1. Why do people live in certain places? 2. What are the different places where people live? 3. What are the differences between these places?
  After the introduction we would read through the whole passage and answer the above questions. After writing down these answers I would give the student a handful of highlighters and tell her that we are going to go through the passage again but this time we are going to highlight the main points after each paragraph. After reading each paragraph I will ask her to tell the main points and she will get to highlight the words. After the entire passage is finished we will reanswer the questions and compare the new answers to the old answers and celebrate their completeness.